East Greenville Council will be considering new procedures for anyone who might be tying up borough streets after the Upper Montgomery Joint Authority (UMJA) blocked Hickory Alley for a week and did not notify residents and the borough they would be doing work there.

“They were pushing traffic through a private lot,” said Mayor Ryan Sloyer. Sloyer said the UMJA workers did not ask permission to divert traffic across the gravel lot behind B&H Furniture and Appliances, nor did they give the residents any advance notice that they might be smelling strange odors in their garages and basements.

“I think council needs to re-emphasize that if anyone wants to shut a street totally closed, we need a plan,” said Sloyer.

Borough Manager Jim Fry told the council they might want to consider requiring a standard e-mail to notify the borough along with road closed and detour signs.

The council agreed that they should have new procedures drawn up by the next council meeting, at the end of the month.

In other council business Solicitor Barry Tomlinson gave the council a draft ordinance for parking regulations at the parking lot behind Borough Hall.

The purpose of the ordinance is to bar overnight parking at the borough lot, especially parking by nearby residents. The draft ordinance proposed that there would be no parking from midnight to 6:00 a.m., but Council President Josiah Pierson said that time interval might not mesh with the need for late parking at the Grand Theater.

Fry said the police would be checking the lot around 2:00 a.m., so a later start time would not matter.

In a short discussion about parking fines, Mayor Sloyer suggested that the fines should be as much as $500, but Councilman Tim Huff proposed that the lot be posted as a tow-away zone instead. “Those tow-away signs always get my attention,” said Huff.

The council sent the whole matter back to Tomlinson, who said he would have a new draft ready in a month.

The council voted to stand firm on their insistence that the property owner of 128 Fifth Street pay $544.30 to the borough in reimbursement for costs related to a subdivision plan at the property.

The subdivision was not completed after a deal to sell a house on the property fell through. The property owner did not want to pay the borough’s costs because the subdivision was not completed.

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